Richard Whitmire, a former editorial writer at USA Today and past board president of the National Education Writers Association, is a frequent commentator on national education issues.

New report on black males shows that non-poor black boys fare no better in school than white boys who live in poverty. The report from the Council of Great City School Districts calls the situation a "national catastrophe." The CGCS is right, of course. And this is a valuable report. However, I'll never understand why groups investigating the problems of black males choose to wade into this battle half blind. Similar to previous reports, the CGCS document mostly sticks to the black males/white males comparisons. That's important -- but only part of the story. The other half: why are ...

The grade gender gaps are driving in part by homework. In short, girls do it, and do it well. Boys ... not so much. The Times describes one solution -- at rates as much as $100 an hour. Okay, this may be more of a Manhattan solution....

Economic reasons play in role in why a growing number of single mothers live with a partner, but don't marry the partner, according to this Times piece about a Census study. To be a marriageable mate, the father has to bring something significant to the earnings table. As a result of the education gap (and structural changes in the economy) fewer men are measuring up. From the article: Pamela J. Smock, director of the Population Studies Center at the University of Michigan, said many people delayed marriage until they had achieved a basic level of economic security. "Economic situations really ...

Bill Costello in a commentary in educationnews.org. From the commentary: Among 25-to-29-year-olds, 33 percent of women have earned at least a bachelor's degree compared with just 23 percent of men. This is the first generation of women to be more educated than their male counterparts. This shift means that women will increasingly get the highly paid jobs while men will experience a drop in earnings. This is already happening. Men in their 30's are the first generation to earn significantly less income than their fathers' generation did at the same age. As jobs that require little education increasingly shrink, ...

Education Week has a nice profile of a Washington charter school working with youths serving time. Here's a revealing comment from one of the youths: "The good news," he said, is here "you have a teacher who likes you and supports you, and kids don't make fun of you if you can't read." Being school failures, especially non readers, probably explains why many of them landed there in the first place....